2021 AAFP Feline Senior Care Guidelines

Abstract

The ‘2021 AAFP Feline Senior Care Guidelines’ are authored by a Task Force of experts in feline clinical medicine and serve as an update and extension of those published in 2009. They emphasize the individual patient evaluation and the process of aging, with references to other feline practice guidelines for a more complete discussion of specific diseases. Focusing on each cat encourages and empowers the owner to become a part of the cat’s care every step of the way. A comprehensive discussion during the physical examination and history taking allows for tailoring the approach to both the cat and the family involved in the care. Videos and analysis of serial historical measurements are brought into the assessment of each patient. These Guidelines introduce the emerging concept of frailty, with a description and methods of its incorporation into the senior cat assessment. Minimum database diagnostics are discussed, along with recommendations for additional investigative considerations. For example, blood pressure assessment is included as a minimum diagnostic procedure in both apparently healthy and ill cats. Cats age at a much faster rate than humans, so practical timelines for testing frequency are included and suggest an increased frequency of diagnostics with advancing age. The importance of nutrition, as well as senior cat nutritional needs and deficiencies, is considered. Pain is highlighted as its own syndrome, with an emphasis on consideration in every senior cat. The Task Force discusses anesthesia, along with strategies to allow aging cats to be safely anesthetized well into their senior years. The medical concept of quality of life is addressed with the latest information available in veterinary medicine. This includes end of life considerations like palliative and hospice care, as well as recommendations on the establishment of ‘budgets of care’, which greatly influence what can be done for the individual cat. Acknowledgement is given that each cat owner will be different in this regard; and establishing what is reasonable and practical for the individual owner is important. A discussion on euthanasia offers some recommendations to help the owner make a decision that reflects the best interests of the individual cat.

Association between feline immunodeficiency virus and Leishmania infantum infections in cats: a retrospective matched case-control study

“…Higher antibody titers in dogs are associated with the progression of infection to disease, but a longitudinal clinical, serological and parasitological evaluation of cats is needed to correctly analyze these data [ 46 ]. However, age can also influence host susceptibility to diseases in case of kittens or senior age [ 49 , 50 ], but we did not set age groups with this aim. Iatta et al [ 5 ] compared cats aged between 19 and 72 months (adults) with younger and older cats.…”

Vaccination of Immunocompromised Cats

“…Seniority in animals is defined as beginning at an age that is 25% below the average life expectancy within the species/breed, which would be calculated as eleven years in cats [ 172 ]. Although feline life stage guidelines [ 173 ] and general senior care guidelines have been published by the American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP) [ 174 ] and the American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) [ 172 ] and implementation of senior/geriatric health care program in veterinary practice has been proposed [ 175 ], so far, there are no specific vaccination recommendations for senior or geriatric cats, and there is a general lack of knowledge if geriatric cats have special vaccination needs.…”

Successful and Unsuccessful Brain Aging in Pets: Pathophysiological Mechanisms behind Clinical Signs and Potential Benefits from Palmitoylethanolamide Nutritional Intervention

“…Failure to respond to commands, decreased interest toward novelty, increased time spent sleeping, and frequency of phobias, as well as reduced ability to cope with mild social challenges are further features of normal aging in pets [8][9][10][11]. Learning and memory are not negatively affected in most cases, although cognitive abilities tend to slow down over time [12,13], especially if comorbidities are present, due to the recently acknowledged "frailty syndrome" of the elderly [14,15].…”